"I'm in this cell because they think I decapitated her! I need a counselor—in a league with F. Lee Bailey—not some who handles jaywalking cases."

Advocating the theory that all matter is composed of minute particles, Descartes was a .

"I book for Carnegie Hall, kid, not a showboat on the Mississippi," the agent told the young, naive musician. "Here in New York, people buy tickets to hear virtuosos play Stravinsky on a Fazioli. You just spent six months playing Stephen Foster tunes on a for tourists takin' day trips on a steamboat." With a peremptory flick of his cigar, the agent added: "You might want to see if they let you in the door to study at Julliard if you ever hope to be a client of mine."

Pointing at a whiteboard across the room, the contrarian physicist told his gullible colleagues, "The theory is incorrect because that function over there never reaches zero. It approaches zero, yes, but it never quite gets there. For your theory to be true, the function must reach zero."